MILES CHRISTI

Chapter Twenty-Four

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Chapter Twenty-Four

They crossed into a different world, this place beyond the mountain. Marasch had comforted and re-accoutered them, the Armenians accommodating these strange Western people, unlike the occasional pilgrim they’d see over the years. Where’d they come from? They had an idea, as all peoples have ideas of other people. Sainte Cecelia far away in time and space, on the fringes. But here, near the navel of the earth where the spirit glows, the air multidimensional. Infused with God. So thick, one can feel Him. Full of strain – the love of God, the anger of God, the jealously of God, the mercy of God.

O’ atheist readers, can you imagine what this is? You of deep compassion, resigned there is no It. Their world is mad and caught upon a whirlwind. ‘Religion ruins everything,’ the drink-soaked popinjay said as he stood on shallow sand. Sin is sin until it is my sin and therefore reason . . . and reason the property of subjective man . . .

Aile purchased a fluted helm the like of Italian Normans, polished and modern, a hauberk to fit her size, a sturdy buckler, lance and spear. Better than what she had, but no guiding light. Steely for a man. What Tíbald knew – Aile saw it. Journeyman’s tools and iron heavy. Part of her still on the mountain. Which part, she could not tell. Odd to be unknowing when insight’s been clear. Had she changed? Constantinople far away too. A different land over the mountain. Where is the green? She missed green. Nary a threat, green. The rock here unyielding. The center of the world hard. Going down to Jerusalem is hard. It will not meet expectations she feared. The people too different. Cruel. Yet the pilgrims just as cruel but knew it. Their veritas, as if Capital sins were their invention. As if only they could feel guilt. What hubris. But this was the land of El, Adonai, ha Shem. Where in the heat and dryness, God spoke to Abram. She did not understand this, for the bible stories related only to her, spoke truth as pertained to her. What in the world did the Love of God mean? A consummate yet exacting love. Jealous love. Tested on the mountain. Were those who fell cursed – the Tower of Siloam? Or called home. Thrust home. What terror when God thrusts us home – strips the breath and rushes us into the unknown, which, in fact, has been ubiquitously experienced by billions prior to us . . . What does it say for those left? The beasts who fell – to their own heaven, their own hell . . .

Leave the mountain. You’re on the meadow grass now. That the rest they encounter be like the Armenians. Christian people. Much to our thinking, Christians are not good – not real Christians . . . What’s a real Christian? Who turned Jēsu into a gentile man? They turn Him into so many things. And we turn Him with them, opposed to them . . .

Now a jump into Tíbald’s head (I can do that). He too, half on the mountain, and yet here, lazing scattered with leaves atop the grass. He prayed: I don’t want You to be a Jēsu of my making, my servant, my aid. I must be the voluntary slave to Your mastery. I can always leave. I can mutiny . . .

Where went the Nothing?

Come to Jerusalem and meet me there.

******************

Antioch, at the height of imperial days, was the third greatest city in that ancient world. It was here Jēsu’s followers were first called Christians. Here where Sainte Peter established his first bishopric. Where the scales fell off Sainte Paul’s eyes. First among the diaspora. First among the gentile saints. In war and in culture. At the heart of the great trading lanes. A shadow of its splendour now, having been sacked by Persians and Arabs, and rocked by earthquakes for the past five hundred years. Antioch, though much formidable, seemed the target of the world’s darts. The Byzantines, for a time, had revived it, but the great caravans began to bypass the city for Aleppo. Then came the Seljuks and transformed it into a fortress on the Syrian frontier. A lion at the gate, though mostly a Christian city – Greek Christians hated the Armenian Christians who hated the Syrian Christians. Yaghi-Siyan, the Seljuk governor for over ten years kept the good graces of citizenry he did not trust. Saracen and Christians lived in relative peace, while Yaghi-Siyan intrigued with more powerful Saracen princes securing a practical independence. This changed with the approaching pilgrim army: Patriarch, John Oxite, was imprisoned, Christian leaders ejected from the city, the Cathedral of Sainte Peter was turned into a stable. Christians no longer were citizens, but cockroaches and blight. So widespread the persecution, when the pilgrim armies came in view, Christians in the surrounding villages slaughtered the local garrisons, losing as many of their own. Yaghi-Siyan, the leader who didn’t care, scurried to Saracens emirs he’d often betrayed. Many spurred him, if not wanting to take his head, but some saw the Franks for what they were – a chance to consolidate power. As the Franks entered Syria, two Saracen armies were rumoured preparing to march to Antioch’s relief. Yaghi-Siyan, most practical of suzerains, in the meantime, gathered supplies and locked himself in. Antioch could withstand a siege. Surrounding the entire city was a massive wall that climbed to the peak of Mount Silpius, on whose crest, the Citadel dominated the city below. Four hundred towers covered Antioch’s every approach. Never did a city so throw up a challenge and begged for war. The marshy lowlands outside the gates, a muck to take a pede down without aid of arrow or javelin, was guarded by the river, Orontes, rendering the city independent of outside wells, market gardens inside the walls for pastureland and flocks. Impossible to surround as no sieging force could be stationed on the mountain itself. But when Yaghi-Siyan beheld the columns flowing from the mountains in endless streams, he knew he could not lose a single man until reinforcements came. Had Satan sent the entire West here? The air hummed with singing warriors. They were over the mountain heading toward the center of the world.

Christian dogs.

Though to Yaghi-Siyan, they were never dogs, not any more than any other people. ‘Dogs’ a term depending where you hurl it. Shiia dogs. Jewish dogs. They form their packs, and he used them as packs. That you may esteem them as individuals, but as a people, not care for them at all. All that mattered was Yaghi-Siyan be a rich and powerful man. Allah commands it . . . to his thinking.

But here they come – the West. A fanatical people. An exacting people. With their priest and holy men proclaiming miracles. They proclaim and so it’s true: ‘If ye have faith and say to the mountain be risen up and cast into the sea, the mountain will do it.’ What frame their madness other than miracles? Their ethereal chants echoing off stone walls as if this world is not this world but a shadow of the world to come. The daily bread of their Man-God. Blasphemy – the worst of the revealed religions. And these, the sisterhood of rabbinic Jews? No wonder they despise each other. Give us Jews, their warring days over. And how they could war . . .  They war for us now. We are better rulers. We allow them space as keepers of infant truth. They think deep judgments, as they would have us think they think deep judgment, and bond with us over a common foe – Christian dogs . . . Look at them, the Christians, boiling like a river to overrun us with their Truth . . . but we have the Truth.

What is this about Truth?

It’s about a city! A most marvelous city, not the Navel of the Earth, but its trim gut and chest. Who holds Antioch, holds the road to Jerusalem, and the Mount and the once great Temple – the Second Temple, traditional, freewheeling, the pinnacle when ‘Īsā came. It is no more. They are no more. Lambs no longer slaughtered. But the Lamb slaughtered the Christians say. For Jerusalem is a Christian city, absconded, and absconded again, and again. Taken as a desert hovel when nobody cared. No tightly bound Vulgates, no complete assemblies of Tanakh. And here they come to die to reclaim that history – that ‘Īsā came to earth as God-Man and He walks among them now with His angels and saints in an invisible army. And Yaghi-Siyan defends a city of stone, mortar, and wood – for his power, for his preservation.  

Fight! Fight! Come back to the fight! The ring of swords! The clash of men! Easier not to make them human. They fall faceless. Nameless. As I will fall and will you. So the living can go on living. The dead are no more – not in this world. Not so, the Christians say.  But the swords! The swords! Bring out the swords! Let the historians grumble . . . Must men need God to fight? Life is stronger than death. Does it not punch through? And then we are left to find meaning . . .

Yaghi-Siyan – man of his time – hold out, hold through. They want his city like his beautiful wife. More than fúk her but woo her back to the true God. They squabble . . . like the Seljuks themselves – evangelists. ‘Īsā, the Christian god as they had made him. How deep their theology is thrown. They pervert his message for he was the greatest among the prophets. The Jewish Mashiach – yes. Born of a Virgin – yes. Wonder Worker – yes. Crucified, died and was buried– no, an illusion as God had taken him to heaven. Islam’s second greatest prophet . . .

******************

Bohemond came on like a ravenous wolf but staggered at Antioch’s fortifications. No city, to date, so formidable. Walls at fantastic angles – no mere city, but a kingdom unto itself. The Iron Bridge, the first line of defense, twelve miles north of the city, flanked by strong towers. Antioch in the distance wavering in crenels of heat as if it might decide to cloak and disappear. It will not and will be mine, Bohemond vowed, by force or subterfuge. 

But Adhemar, inspired, rushed forward from Raymond’s contingent, beholding the bristling defense. Impossible city . . . With God, nothing is impossible. A Saracen provision train was crossing the Iron Bridge. He galloped with his seigneurs where the remnants cleared the gate towers. Defenders in the train and on the gates wondered what he could do with his band of fifty? His mitre atop his helm marked him as a prelate who would carry no sword or lance. What was he set to do? Negotiate? If we free the Christians, he’ll spare our lives? Or that we’re baptised in the name of ‘Īsā – eat his body, drink his blood . . .

Adhemar reined in before a Saracen captain. No one moved. The archers in the bridge tower eased their pull as the bishop and captain stared at each other, no august or anger on either countenance. The captain had a plain face and green eyes. Green eyes – for the life of Adhemar – green eyes – all his Saracen comrades were brown. Would the Saracen captain give him his hand? A touch before the conflagration? But instead surveyed the massive pilgrim armies streaming unto the plain and resigned himself. “Allah Akbar,” a bear movement of his lips in simple proclamation. Adhemar whirled his cudgel over his head and crushed a Turk’s skull, splattering the man’s brains on his miter, the green eyes popping out. A blow on Antioch’s head. On the Devil’s. The captain had to die. Disfigured. Beauty is a feign. Courtesies are a feign; God has no courtesy when He hurls you into Gehenna . . .

All this before he could think, a hail of arrows. Fortunate his massive kite shield and his seigneurs came to his aid.

Raymond sent his centuries forward. The Saracens retreated to the city. Bohemond and Godfrey overran the outlying villages where the locals protected themselves with painted crosses on their cloaks. To kill again and not be a hapless victim. To fight – that’s what they do. Their weapons thirsty. Unreasoning. Insatiable. An immorality that cannot be undone till either dead or empty. So concupiscence. But if survived, and revived, it must be done more till all a bloody mess and a gluttony as a dog returns to vomit. But how they wanted to fight coming off the mountain. And Antioch a pure and fantasy kingdom alone on the plain – one the Devil showed Christ in a moment of temptation – if you fall down and worship me, all shall be yours . . .

“Attack now,” Raymond insisted in council. “Storm the city praising Christ. How pious Raymond. “Look how they flee! God will surely grant us victory.” He may if ye have faith the size of a mustard seed . . . No one has faith the size of a mustard seed.

Attack!

“No,” Bohemond said flatly. “The armies need rest. An assault demands planning. We cannot afford needless loss. Tancred will soon join us from Alexandretta. We should request siege engines from the Basileus. Taticius informs me the Genoese fleet is on its way with reinforcements---”

“‘Taticius informs you’?” Raymond incredulous (Taticius of the Diabolical Mountain).

“We should wait,” Bohemond said.

Attack!

The rest agreed.

Attack! Attack fools!

Raymond looked to Adhemar. “This Yaghi-Siyan is at this moment weak. He sits behind his walls because he must lack men. Attack the city now and it will fall.”

For whom?

The princes would not be swayed. Adhemar remained neutral. Raymond’s hatred of Bohemond increased.

Days passed. Bohemond covertly communicated with Turkish nobles inside the city, and Yaghi-Siyan the same bribing Christians in their camps on their reluctance to attack.

No fight pure when it comes to money. On the mountain they threw their arms away. Their reactions a memory coded in the skin – we move that way naturally. How natural their opposite when safe. The Devil in procrastination.

Could it be, Yaghi-Siyan thought, they don’t know what I have?

He ordered sorties against the pilgrims forging the countryside and cut them down without pity. How more intimidating his force appeared. Then came news Yaghi-Siyan hoped for – far to the east a great army – Emirs and kings would march in the spring. Survive the winter. If ye had faith the size of a mustard seed, spoke the prophet.

*****************

Martinmas – November – a harvest festival in the Christian camps, meagre festival at that with its gaming and carnivals easily set aside; the pilgrims had very little. But Martinmas . . . Martinmas – Sainte Martin of Tours and Jēsu in disguise, and the memory of Aile’s voice: “You will hunt the boar?” “You’re lax.” “If the harvest is poor, they take from our share and hide it.” “I will not starve.”

Tíbald received Eucharist today. As did Aile. And Joceran. Marin said a short Mass, Tíbald insisted. Marin, half of himself since on the journey, he cut his robes down by half, pressed the Species on Tíbald’s tongue. Was the Eucharist different from this half-man than the sot in Sainte Cecilia? Had the fingers more apostolic power? The Body of Christ was just so and Marin vessel more than agent. But to be said – different now. After so much killing, that the Species retained the look of bread and wine was a mercy. Into the gob – the Holy of Holies of each communicate. Jēsu in disguise? Really? Really? Only to the hard of heart . . . And who is not hard of heart in instances? Who is the soul after Eucharist whose life in not changed? Is Jēsu emotion? A stirring in the gut and said not to be had when without passion? A call. A pull. A state of mind? We see in a mirror darkly. We touch through elements of daily life.

Tíbald and Aile rested against a log near a firepit in each other’s grip having doffed their iron. The sun low in the west, halfway into the Mediterranean, cast a glow on the walls to throw their shadows up Mount Silipius to the citadel atop which glowed like a beacon. Sainte Cecilia did not exist. How the pilgrimage started, is what it is not now. And Tíbald and Aile changed. Never the same world from moment to moment though topographies appear unmovable. Aye, Antioch as it was one hundred years before. And Tíbald’s voraciousness reduced to an anorexia of the heart. He had no say as it beat on and on not hungry. Highs were not highs. Lows not low. God – not to think (he does not think other men think?), but to lose himself in the sunset bouncing off Antioch’s walls. He is a man going ‘to’. Aile is a woman coming ‘from’. That they meet, arms ‘round his shoulders, his head in her lap. The pilgrimage is wearing, like a hot, sandy wind dampening their prickliness. They are not so big having climbed and fell. ‘Fell’? They are here – see it. They are falling, even now.

Soon his cohort would mount the picket among the other Normans opposing the north wall. Aile with them, not an oddity, but soldier now. No talent. No distinction. An average pede. No plumes. A buckler without coat-of-arms. Constantinople infinitely far away. She missed the green . . . Sainte Cecilia . . . the green of Sainte Cecilia, never the place itself. We do not grow bigger but dwarf as time goes on until so diminished when the heart’s object is placed in our hands, how could it have ever mattered?

Antioch’s walls a fading umber now, transmuting to teal and darkening. Breach them. Attack now at dusk on Martinmas when no one is ready. Ladders to the battlements and over the top. Rush through the streets. Slaughter. A riot. Torches and blood. It’s done. It’s done. Antioch is done. Let the princes squabble over it. Then one more. The one we came to die for. The last one. How can they delay?